Quote Originally Posted by JMA View Post
Ken, the simple truth is that "winning" in Afghanistan is no longer considered possible and now it is just a matter of a US withdrawal in a face saving manner (if that is possible) if not leave like the Soviets did.
It was never possible. I've been saying that since early 2002 when what we wanted (not necessarily needed) to do there was effectively completed. We should not have decided to stay because once we did we locked ourselves in to a no-win situation.

Unfortunately, George W. Bush forgot his job as POTUS and recalled that he was a good Christan and did the Christan thing, he decided to 'fix' what 'we' had 'broken.' There were four big flaws in that.

- The job of POTUS is to take care of US interests, humanistic follies and US domestic political concerns as well as personal beliefs can be -- should be -- considered but net cost should be weighed against benefits. He did not accept the cost-benefit analysis which pretty much predicted what has occurred though it underestimated those costs. He made a poor decision...

- The possibility of our being able to 'fix' it in less than two generations -- if ever -- was microscopic at best.

- The 'we' gets transmogrified in affairs like this. The US DoD has a vested interest in creating conflicts and places to go, things to do. We as a nation too often succumb to that interest and poke into things we should not and yet we do not have the political will (we here includes uniformed and civilian 'politicians' and their ilk...) to use force properly so we end up doing a poor job -- and get way with it... That same organization has a 'can do' attitude and will salute and say "Yes, Sir" while marching over a cliff. It is reluctant to say that some things are not possible or not with the tools available so the relatively ignorant civilian masters give a flawed task and the Armed Forces will try to execute even if they do not have the wherewithal to do it. G.W.B. said "go forth and do great things" and few if any said "Boss, that is really stoopid..."

- We did not break it, it was already broken.

So we got engaged where we should not have in a manner that we had earlier proven was totally futile and not appropriate to the US and I've been saying since '02 that we'd get out based on the US electoral cycle. Just as we 'got out' of Iraq and elsewhere...

We're slow learners, we have no continuity mostly because of oversize egos so we love to reinvent the wheel, because, after all the "They failed but we're smarter so we can do it correctly" attitude, while very human, has adversely affected nations for years. See socialism...